Here comes more money for YouTube videos. But these dollars don’t come from YouTube: Time Warner is leading a big round of financing for Maker Studios, a start-up that specializes in creating and distributing clips for the video giant.

The media conglomerate, via its Time Warner Investments arm, is leading a $40 million round that sources say should close within the next three weeks.

I don’t know the other players in the round, and they may not be set yet. I also don’t have a pre-money valuation for the Los Angeles-based company, but it should be at least $150 million, which would put the total value for the company in the $200 million range by the time the deal is done. Maker had previously raised $4 million from Greycroft Partners and GRP Partners. (Update: I’m told the company has raised a total of $15 million to date, which makes much more sense.)

Last week, Variety reported that Time Warner was considering an investment in Maker. Both Maker and Time Warner declined to comment.

And there may be more YouTube money to come: Industry sources say that Fullscreen, another big YouTube hub, has been talking to Bertelsmann’s RTL Group about a large investment, though it’s unclear whether the two companies will move forward.

But while lots of video makers were happy to take Google’s money to finance their productions, many of them have privately complained that Google hasn’t done a great job of promoting their clips to viewers and selling them to advertisers. Sources say that at least some of Maker’s new round will go toward building out the company’s direct sales force.

Just as the atom bomb was the weapon that was supposed to render war obsolete, the Internet seems like capitalism’s ultimate feat of self-destructive genius, an economic doomsday device rendering it impossible for anyone to ever make a profit off anything again. It’s especially hopeless for those whose work is easily digitized and accessed free of charge.

— Author Tim Kreider on not getting paid for one’s work

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